By way of background, the LTP is a community
project in inner city Manchester that has been working on local
transport issues for four years. The area, Longsight, has a high
ethnic population and low car ownership. The first piece of work
was a detailed consultation of the local community to find out
what transport and related issues local residents were concerned
about, culminating with the report "Better Buses and Safer
Streets for Longsight". Since this report was published,
in 2003, a community group has formed and, with the facility of
a paid worker and support from Friends of the Earth, has begun
to take forward the issues raised in the report. These issues
include not only public transport but also walking, cycling, traffic
and parking. Its activities include a website to encourage participation,
a monthly radio show, ongoing monitoring and consultation work
and involvement in key policy mechanisms including the Local Strategic
Partnership and Ward Co-ordination Meetings. In June and July,
the project will be carrying out independent monitoring of buses
in the area, by means of postcards for commenting on individual
journeys. We would be happy to share this information with the
Transport Committee once it is compiled. More information about
our work can be found at the website www.transportlongsight.org.uk,
from which the 2003 report and a recent update to it can be downloaded.

Those involved in the project were very interested
to learn that the Government is reviewing the quality of bus service
provision because this is an issue that arises frequently when
discussing transport issues in the local community. On first sight,
the area is relatively well served by bus routes. There is a quality
bus corridor, the 192, along the A6 with a frequency of roughly
every 10 minutes. The 53 route is cross-city and connects many
important areas of Manchester which are vital for the local community's
links to work, health care, education and networks of family and
friends and the timetable gives a frequency of roughly every 20
minutes during the day. There are other less frequent services
that take different routes into the city centre and, especially
considering that they pass hospitals and universities, are equally
as important. The two main companies who operate in the area are
First, who run the 53, and Stagecoach, who run the 192. The area
is also a short walk and or trip on some of the bus routes to
the Wilmslow Road corridor, which is known as the busiest bus
route in Europe, along which many companies compete for the buoyant
student market.

Despite the apparent wealth of bus services,
there are a number of reasons why we would advise this inquiry
to very seriously consider the development of much firmer regulatory
powers to improve and maintain high standards of performance of
bus companies and control the routes they take. This is a conclusion
that we and others have arrived at over a number of years of trying
to get improvements in the bus services and offer the following
pieces of evidence in support of our advice:

1. The 53 route has a reputation for performing
extremely poorly in terms of punctuality. This was one of the
most frequent complaints during our consultation in 2003 and again
during vox pop interviews for our radio show in 2006. A
recent project carried out by students at the School of Environment
and Development at the University of Manchester confirmed that
reliability is still poor. This is despite the fact that the 53
has been subject to a Performance Improvement Plan since January
this year. Discussions with GMPTE about this service have confirmed
this but we have been unable to see the data on reliability because
of commercial sensitivity. First have been unwilling to discuss
this issue with us and GMPTE and Manchester City Council are as
powerless as we are to penalise the company for poor performance.

2. As part of the Performance Improvement
Plan, Moss Side, an area of Manchester with high levels of social
exclusion and low levels of car ownership, was removed from the
route. Very little information was given about this to the community
or to the bus users and what information that was provided was
at very short notice. The route went instead along part of the
busy Wilmslow Road Corridor, and First argued that this was intended
to improve the performance of the route as a whole. In the aforementioned
student project, the authors considered this claim and concluded
that this change of route did not cut out significance traffic
congestion from the route. A community meeting formed as a result
of this decision and, with the involvement of a Manchester City
Council Councilor, signatures were collected for a petition to
ask for GMPTE to either order First to return to Moss Side or
to put on a replacement service. Residents expressed frustration
at not being able to get to Longsight Market, to work and to educational
opportunities. Many were relying on private taxis, which they
could scarcely afford. With the limited funds GMPTE has available
for such interventions, it arranged a subsidised route, the 54,
which runs less frequently and with sparser coverage throughout
the day as a whole. Because of tendering rules, GMPTE had to accept
the most competitive bid, which was from First, despite the fact
that the situation had been created by First and their record
of poor performance on this route. One might suggest that First
has had its cake and eaten it: not only shedding a presumably
low profit section of the route, but also then being paid by GMPTE
to bring it back. It is an example of GMPTE, to whom most people
direct their complaints about bus services, having no powers to
regulate the performance of buses and very limited funds to pick
up the pieces when private companies pull out of areas that desperately
need bus services.

3. There has recently been an issue on the
A6, the quality bus corridor, whereby a new operator, GM Buses,
have run a route to compete exactly with the 192 run by Stagecoach.
Stagecoach's reaction was to put even more buses onto the route,
at times creating congestion and chaos at bus stops. At one point
there were Stagecoach representatives in what looked like riot
gear at one of the busiest bus stops because of fears of arguments
that might result from this direct competition. Since the buses
ran at the same times and were priced approximately the same as
the Stagecoach buses, there is little to support a claim that
this is healthy competition. It has been reported to me that the
hospital at the Stockport end of the route, Stepping Hill, has
felt that the number of buses passing through the site was simply
inappropriate in terms of traffic management and air quality.
It is difficult to see how this competition is helping the people
who live on that corridor and/or use the route. Greater regulatory
powers and a franchising system, as is in place in London, would
mean that the authorities could keep bus traffic to acceptable
levels.

4. The Wilmslow Road corridor, although enjoying
a level of service that no other route in England has in terms
of the frequency of buses, is chaos. This is because many companies
are running the same route and competing for passengers. Various
estimations of patronage have been suggested from research, one
as low as 3.5 passengers per bus on average. In actual fact the
exact figures are not available to us because of commercial sensitivity.
Stagecoach prices along this route are high and smaller companies
buy up cheaper, older and dirtier buses and carry passengers for
as little as a third of the Stagecoach price. Some of them still
carry London posters because they are rejected stock from London,
where standards are higher. Observations reported to us suggest
that they will wait to fill up with as many passengers as possible
rather than sticking to a timetable and there have been reports
of some companies waiting at a stop until another company's bus
is just behind and then pulling off. Although one has to wait
literally seconds for a bus, the congestion at certain junctions
because of too many buses and the unwillingness of these buses
to stick to timetables makes travelling on this route an unpleasant
and stressful one. At the point where the Metrolink track shares
road space with buses, trams have been known to have to wait behind
a queue of up to ten buses, whilst the buses wait to get into
Piccadilly bus station, which is overcrowded to the point of congestion,
therefore adding to the levels of congestion throughout the city
centre and presenting danger to the pedestrians who share this
space with the buses. As long as any company can run any route
they choose at any time for any price with any standard of bus,
this is likely continue.

5. Price increases on most services have
been well above inflation and this again is something that the
authorities have no regulatory powers to stop. At the same time,
the city council pursues a strategy of sustainable development
and should therefore be encouraging cheaper bus prices to promote
modal shift away from the private car.

6. Similarly, the effect of exhaust fumes
from buses, particularly the older buses on the Wilmslow Road
corridor, goes unchecked and this is a major public health and
environmental impact. In fact, Manchester gets London's older
buses since emission standards in London are higher.

I trust that the above is evidence enough of
the need to give authorities such as GMPTE more regulatory powers
and of the need to learn from some of the successes of London
and apply them to conurbations such as Greater Manchester. In
particular, more powers must be given to penalise poor reliability,
regulate unfair price rises and clean up the dirtier buses. A
franchise system, whereby companies cannot just cherry pick the
more profitable routes would help protect communities such as
Moss Side from the sudden loss of their services.

Of those organisations currently dealing with
public transport, GMPTE seems to us to be the most appropriate
to receive additional regulatory powers. However, it is important
that this inquiry reviews the composition of the PTEs and the
way they operate, in order to ensure that they are accountable
to bus users.

The Committee asked what the future of the bus
is and it is clear when working in communities, particularly those
who have poor quality services, that the bus is essential in tackling
social exclusion. It has the unrealised potential to provide affordable
transportation not only to the city centre but also to work, education,
shopping, health and social needs throughout the city. To do this
though, it needs to offer an integrated network of services that
go where people need to go and offer easy to understand through-ticketing.
Given the urgent need to reduce climate change emissions, the
bus is also part of the integrated transport system required to
provide an attractive alternative to the ever increasing use of
private cars.